The first thing that came to mind when listening to ‘Conversations With My Therapist’ was “oh god, not another female singer trying to fill the large boots of man in the rock music genre”. But I have to admit the songs are unpredictably catchy. I hadn’t heard anything of SAL before and the name created this false image of a group of dumb, balding “rock stars” throwing together crude lyrics and basic riffs. How wrong I was, ‘Demons’ is a piano-led heart warmer which holds the listeners attention through to the final chord. Next track is ‘Devil May care’, a raw and gripping journey which won the 2008 James Bond theme tune competition.

I frequently exclaim that relatively unheard of bands are “unheard of” because they lack depth, whereas with SAL this is not the case, in fact I can’t understand why I haven’t heard of them before because they are as good as any other band soaking up the limelight currently and all of this is down to Cat’s vocals. ‘Demons’, ‘Perfections’, the end of ‘California’ and ‘Invisible’ contrast with the heavier tracks to create an album balanced with true aplomb. ‘Perfections’ shows exactly why women are becoming more and more to the fore throughout music, those with true talent and beautiful vocals can soar to limitless heights and I believe that Cat could possess the wings that could make SAL soar.

At present FLORENCE AND THE MACHINE are dominating the mainstream music industry, Florence Welch’s voice is second to none, but it is her choice of music and direction that has allowed the band to become more accessible. SAL it seems has similarly moulded their sound to become as appealing as possible to the rock branch of the massive musical “tree”. Overall a good album crafted almost to perfection and definitely one to check out.

Rating: 4.0/5.0

Review by Alex Duncalf